In yesterday's Sunday Telegraph on the Sunday Comment page (14), Julie Burchill wrote about Woodstock, the music festival in 1969. It was fifty years ago at this time of year.
Her concluding remarks made me think about this "happening" which is now part of "the swinging sixties" nostalgia. I was a teenager in the Sixties and clearly remember the music, the film, the sex, drugs and rock and roll. I remember it. Was I really there? It was a time when there was free love, casual sex. And girls woke up in bed and asked, "what was your name again?" It did turn sad and sour in the cold light of reality.
Julie writes:
Let this be a warning to us that good fences make good neighbours - and that Utopian enterprises always end up in vulgar wrangles over dirty money.
I would concede that this may happen often, but "always"? Past, present and future?
Does Julie mean in the future? Is there an eschatological dimension to these Utopian enterprises?
I wonder if she has ever heard about or attended Soul Survivor or Greenbelt. Probably not.
It could be argued that these enterprises, these festivals, are Utopian, as they embrace a view of the
future where righteousness reigns and perfection rules. Yes, there is Christian eschatology, a belief in the end times when death, evil and war are removed and the Kingdom of Heaven is established.
At Soul Survivor and Greenbelt there were no vulgar wrangles over dirty money.
Soul Survivor comes to a happy end this year. It will cease, but like Woodstock the legacy will remain. Some of the memories will be happy rather than hippy.
Her concluding remarks made me think about this "happening" which is now part of "the swinging sixties" nostalgia. I was a teenager in the Sixties and clearly remember the music, the film, the sex, drugs and rock and roll. I remember it. Was I really there? It was a time when there was free love, casual sex. And girls woke up in bed and asked, "what was your name again?" It did turn sad and sour in the cold light of reality.
Julie writes:
Let this be a warning to us that good fences make good neighbours - and that Utopian enterprises always end up in vulgar wrangles over dirty money.
I would concede that this may happen often, but "always"? Past, present and future?
Does Julie mean in the future? Is there an eschatological dimension to these Utopian enterprises?
I wonder if she has ever heard about or attended Soul Survivor or Greenbelt. Probably not.
It could be argued that these enterprises, these festivals, are Utopian, as they embrace a view of the
future where righteousness reigns and perfection rules. Yes, there is Christian eschatology, a belief in the end times when death, evil and war are removed and the Kingdom of Heaven is established.
At Soul Survivor and Greenbelt there were no vulgar wrangles over dirty money.
Soul Survivor comes to a happy end this year. It will cease, but like Woodstock the legacy will remain. Some of the memories will be happy rather than hippy.
1 comment:
Some people regard Julie Burchill as a walking contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction.
Post a Comment